Pesticide pathways: close chemical consideration of the hydrolytic degradation of organophosphorus pesticides will lead to refined environmental risk assessment.

Canadian Chemical News, April, 2005 by Buncel, Erwin; Van Loon, Gary W.

Anthropogenically synthesized pesticides constitute a number of different structural types--the principal ones being triazines, organochlorines, carbamates, and organophosphorus pesticides. (2) A number of reviews, including structure-activity correlations, are available to the interested reader. (2-5) This article is restricted to consideration of organophosphorus (OP) pesticides, which constitute the largest class of pesticides synthesized with 63 compounds currently in use globally. While less persistent in the environment than organochlorine pesticides, their usage in recent years is being restricted by government agencies in both Canada and the U.S. due to concerns about the effects of OP derivatives on humans and other organisms. In Canada, some of the most widely...

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